


countdown

by roserade



Category: Love Live! School Idol Project
Genre: Birthday, F/F, Gen, OT3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-02
Updated: 2015-11-02
Packaged: 2018-04-29 14:51:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5131661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/roserade/pseuds/roserade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Getting a birthday present for Hoshizora Rin shouldn't be this hard.</p>
            </blockquote>





	countdown

 

**three weeks**

“Do you have any idea what to get her?” she asks, brows furrowed in annoyance as she thumbs through a furniture catalogue. There’s the noise of paper crinkling and Hanayo looks up.

“Maki-chan… you’re not thinking of getting Rin-chan something from there, are you?” Hanayo bites her lip, watching Maki glare at a page’s worth of minimalistic shelves and other storage options. “Because, I-I don’t think Rin-chan wants extra furniture for her birthday.”

“What? Y-Yeah, of course,” Maki slams the magazine shut, fingers still clumsily gripping the edges of pages and leaving creases. She lets it drop down to her lap, hastily smoothing down the cover. “I mean, I don’t actually _know_ what to get her. What does she want? Cats? Ramen discounts. New clothes?”

She huffs, turns towards twirling a strand of hair with a finger. Force of habit. Hanayo tries her best to suppress a giggle at the sight, but smiles anyway. Maki scowls.  

“Ah, sorry, Maki-chan,” she says, and the laugh slips out, in tiny puffs and giggles that has her biting her lip again. “It’s just, maybe you’re over-thinking this,” she fiddles with her thumbs, “I’m sure Rin-chan would be more than happy with whatever we’re getting her!”

“Would she?” Maki scowls again, but it doesn’t hide the genuine concern lacing her voice. “I just—” she huffs, “want to do something, n-nice! For her. For her birthday. And since we, we’re—”

Maki stops mid-sentence and turns her attention towards scuffing the floor with the heel of her shoe instead, her cheeks flushed.

“I know.” Hanayo smiles, and finds herself unsurprised at the inexplicable warmth rising in her chest. She supposes it’s because it’s her other best friend wanting to do something for their best friend’s birthday together and they’re honestly her most favourite people in the world, so.

It’s a simple little happy thing like that.  

\--

 

**two and a half?**

“I’ve narrowed it down, to like, three,” says Maki one day when she’s pulled Hanayo aside after class. The teacher dismissed them late and Rin had to rush off immediately for track practice, so here they are, huddled by Maki’s table near the back of their classroom.

“…Three?”

“Options,” Maki produces a piece of paper from her pocket, unfolding and laying it flat out on her desk for Hanayo to see. A list of sorts, scribbled in what was unmistakably Maki’s handwriting with its short sharp strokes and tiny neat font.

“Number one,” Hanayo reads, “ _Something really nice but with a cat_.” She glances back at Maki. “With a cat?”

“Cat-themed. Patterns? Uh,” Maki gestures awkwardly, “Cats. You know, how she is. With cats. Like cats.” It’s pretty much a no-brainer, and Hanayo continues:

“Number two, _we take her out for ramen._ ” She purses her lips. “Ah, but um, Maki-chan, don’t we do that all the time though? Just last week—”

“That shop near the train station, yes, but,” Maki fidgets slightly, her hand twitching in trying to not reach her hair, “We’ll do something different! Something really special, and not—”

“Nothing too expensive,” Hanayo interjects, “…Sorry.”

 “What? No, no, y-you don’t have to apologize, Hanayo, uh—”

“Number three, a song?” She squints at the third item on the list, heavily underlined and punctuated by a string of question marks.

“I- I was thinking about it,” Maki frowns. “It might be a bit much, though? I don’t know. Is it? I can compose something in a week, but…”

She trails off, glancing back and forth between Hanayo and a smudge of dirt on the corner of her desk.

“A song sounds nice,” Hanayo says, thinking of all the times they’ve performed together. Back when they were still first years, fresh-faced and with two more years of high school ahead of them. “I really miss singing Maki-chan’s songs, you know?” She smiles, when Maki reacts with a bashful grumble. “I’m sure Maki-chan will compose something really amazing!”

 “Y-yeah, um, thanks,” Maki says, tucking a loose strand of hair behind her ear and shoving the paper back in her pocket. She nods once, then twice to herself, adjusting the strap of her school bag before getting up taking a step forward. Her hand reaches out for Hanayo’s wrist, “We can go to the music room now, and work out some—”

She stops, eyes widening, what newly set-in determination soon faltering with the realization of, “Wait. We’re really going to do that? A song?” Her mouth presses into a thin line, and Hanayo tilts her head in confusion.

“Maki-chan?”

“No, no, it’s just,” She frowns again. “I haven’t actually thought this through.”

“Let’s just go to the music room, as you said,” Hanayo finds herself saying, taking Maki’s hand and leading the way, “We’ll work something out! For Rin-chan!”

“Yeah,” Maki echoes, letting herself be lightly dragged along by Hanayo, “For Rin-cha—Rin.”

\--

 

**one week and two days**

It turns out that writing a song isn’t as easy as they'd thought it would be.

Correction: Writing a song as isn’t easy as they'd thought it would be, when it’s to be done within two weeks, in secret, and when the person they’ve got to keep it a secret from is none other than Hoshizora Rin, Prime Arm Friend Clinger and Daily Weekday Lunch Instigator. Hanayo already barely manages to quickly tuck away the loose sheets of paper in her bag whenever Rin bounds over for a quick hug or chat or whatever activity she’s planning on roping her and Maki into; it’s an awfully harder task when she has to make up an excuse over rejecting Rin’s suggestions of ramen outings and friend-house visitings.

“We can’t both _not_ go, at the same time,” Maki hisses to her in an urgent whisper. Rin had run off ahead of them, yelling something about spotting a stray cat and ignoring Maki’s warnings about her allergies. “How far are you with the lyrics?”

“Not much,” Hanayo admits, fishing the slightly crumpled sheets out of her bag and discretely (to the best of her ability!) handing it to Maki. “It’s really hard to write! Especially since we had that essay due this week, and there’s the math test coming up…”

“Yeah, Rin’s been bugging me about tutoring her,” Maki sighs, and runs a hand over her face. “I can’t actually say no, can I? It’s math. Rin and math? She’s practically helpless.”

“She’s improved lots though! All thanks to you,” Hanayo gently nudges her on the shoulder. Maki doesn’t really move away or freeze up as she would have long ago, instead leaning equal weight on Hanayo as they walk along.

“You did help a lot too, don’t sell yourself short,” she says softly, and Hanayo would’ve almost fervently denied it, if not for Rin suddenly turning up from behind the corner ahead of them, sneezing, with a calico cat in her arms.

“Kayo-chin! Maki-chan! Look!”

“Rin, no, put it down! What are you doing—”

\--

 

 

**the day before?**

“This isn’t good,” Maki says, her voice muffled from burying her face in her hands, “This isn’t good at all.”

The piano lets out a messy jumble of noise in dissonance as she leans forward, her arms half-pressing down on the keys. She immediately sits up straight, and blinks. “H-how much time do we have left?”

Hanayo checks the tiny cat-shaped clock perched on top of the table in front of her. It ticks on, harmlessly, the paw-print end of the second hand edging closer to a bubbly printed ‘ten’. “Um, about half an hour. Her training ends at six.”

“Ah, so…”

“So…”

She hears Maki let out an audible huff, and watches her place her hands on the keys, poised to play something. A chord sounds out. Several harmonies follow. It’s nothing much, but Hanayo hums idly along, the melody soft and flowing and still going nowhere. It’s the same tune that they came up with nearly three hours ago, the same one that _doesn’t quite_ make it, lacking in what rhythm and resonance they had in mind. It doesn’t quite match up to the words, and of course it doesn’t, when they only had this afternoon and the one before to properly come up with it, in bits and pieces hurriedly put together with all their heartfelt sincerity and really meaning it.

“It’s the thought that counts,” Hanayo reminds her, when the song comes to a jarring halt. “I know, it… it isn’t up to our own expectations but, Rin-chan wouldn’t mind!”

“She wouldn’t, but I-I do mind,” Maki says, and plays the opening bar again, fingers moving in mindless frustration. This time lighter, the tempo quickened and outspeeding the ticking seconds of the clock.

“I mind too,” Hanayo admits in a small voice, feeling some strong feeling welling up and settling in. Determination? Not exactly. “It’s for Rin-chan, and that’s why.”

It’s something much more simpler, the same feeling behind thinking that Rin looks cute no matter what, whether in shorts or skirts or dresses; the same thing behind really turning up to almost all her races, unsurprised but so proud of her and her podium-topping medals, nothing but big grins and warm hugs and hearty exclamations in waves that roll off like sunshine.

She’s sure Maki feels the same way too.

 --

 

**the day itself but**

She turns up to school with slightly nervous pang in her gut, and Maki bumps into her along the corridor on the way to class.

“Have we decided? On what we’re doing,” is the first thing Maki says to her, and Hanayo shakes her head.

“Are we still doing the song?” she asks, taking a quick look over her shoulder and making sure Rin wasn’t around. “We didn’t really finish—”

“I bought—no, um, brought—something,” Maki says, producing the cat-clock from the day before. “Remember, I bought it last week, and it, um, reminded me of her, so maybe we could…?”

“Oh, I—ah—bought something too!” They reach their classroom, and she almost stumbles along mid-step as she pulls out a pack of phone charms from her bag’s side pocket. “H-here!”

Maki blinks. “Cats? They’re dressed as… ramen?”

“They looked really cute, and they’re Rin-chan’s favorite—”

“Kayo-chin!”

Oh.

“R-Rin-chan?!”

There’s an equally startled splutter of noise from Maki as well.

“Kayo-chin, Maki-chan!” Rin stands there in front of them, beaming like the most excitable puppy in all the world. “Guess what day it is!”

“I-I don’t know! You tell me,” Maki’s recovery is smooth, to say the least, and her hands quickly shoot to hide the present behind her back. “Hanayo?”

“Oh! Um, I don’t know either!” She’s really bad at this too herself, almost forgetting about her own present and hoping that Rin didn’t notice. Rin doesn’t, too busy containing a year’s worth of excitement built up within the two-three little steps and bounce that she does, still occupying the doorway separating them from the classroom.

“Music room during lunch?”  Maki whispers to her, when Rin turns away to accept another classmate’s well-wishes.

Hanayo nods. “Train station ramen for dinner,” she adds, feeling her hands curl tightly around the plastic wrapping behind her back. Maki smiles. They take a deep breath.

“Ready? One, two—”

 --

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> a day late but w/e! happy birthday rin!
> 
> (also like after writing this i realised that i messed up bc ... clocks... are not a good gift at all...  
> the whole thing kind of slipped my mind and w ow ok lets pretend these kids r as dumb as me in this one.)
> 
> (maybe pana suddenly remembers but rin likes it too much to not accept it and maki wants to die in a hole bc she shouldve remembered in the first place.)


End file.
